Planners Ok Home For 12 Retarded Adults

ISLE OF WIGHT — A 12-bed group home in Zuni that would provide training to prepare mentally retarded adults for independent living received the endorsement of the Planning Commission on Tuesday.

Vince Doheny, executive director of the Western Tidewater Community Services Board, the group proposing the home, said the facility would serve as transitional housing for "trainable and educable" people.

"The whole idea is to bring these people toward independence," he said.

Residents of the homeon Route 614 would work at sheltered workshops for the disabled or in businesses like fast food or supermarkets, Doheny said. Most of those in the house would stay from two to four years, he said.

Construction costs, which are estimated at $325,000, will be covered by a grant from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The house would cost about $250,000 a year to operate, Doheny said.

A 15-passenger van would be used to provide transportation for the residents, and the home would be staffed by at least one person 24 hours a day, with three to four staff members on duty during the afternoon and evening hours.

The facility would be across the street from Zuni Presbyterian Training Center, which provides education and training for the mentally retarded. Graduates of the training center might move into the group home, Doheny said.

The Western Tidewater Community Services Board operates two similar group homes in Suffolk - one housing nine residents on Holland Road and one housing 12 residents on Finney Avenue.

Planners unanimously recommended approval of the project, which must now go before the Board of Supervisors.

One resident of the area spoke against the proposal. "I, for one, am against it because it's in an area that doesn't give these people anything to do," Jim Stiltner said.

He was also concerned about the mechanism for dealing with problem residents.

"I, for one, am against it because it's in an area that doesn't give these people anything to do." Jim Stiltner, area resident Doheny said the structured nature of the training program and the nature of the people in the home would prevent any problems.

"We're dealing with retarded people who are very, very gentle," Doheny said. "They're very loving and they're no threat to the community whatsover."

In other business, the Planning Commission:

* Recommended approval of an eight-acre shopping center on Route 460 in Windsor.

Plans for the shopping center call for a supermarket, a variety store and a drug store as well as space for 11 smaller shops.

The center would also have space for three other businesses, such as insurance offices, said C. Richard Griffith, Jr., representing the firm developing the project.

* Recommended approval for the developers of the Cy press Creek development in Smithfield to build an interim septic tank system.

The system may be necessary to handle sewage from the first phase of the development until the Smithfield sewage system is expanded to handle the load.

Up to 133 houses would use the system, which would only be used until the Smithfield plant is able to handle the sewage.